data Data Descriptor Urbanization in India: Population and Urban Classification Grids for 2011 Deborah Balk 1,2,* , Mark R. Montgomery 3,4, Hasim Engin 1, Natalie Lin 1, Elizabeth Major 1 and Bryan Jones 1,2 1 CUNY Institute for Demographic Research, City University of New York, New York, NY 10010, USA; [email protected] (H.E.); [email protected] (N.L.); [email protected] (E.M.); [email protected] (B.J.) 2 Baruch College Marxe School of Public and International Affairs, City University of New York, New York, NY 10017, USA 3 Population Council, New York, NY 10017, USA; [email protected] 4 Stony Brook University, New York, NY 11794, USA * Correspondence: [email protected]; Tel.: +1-646-660-6762 Received: 6 December 2018; Accepted: 21 February 2019; Published: 26 February 2019 Abstract: India is the world’s most populous country, yet also one of the least urban. It has long been known that India’s official estimates of urban percentages conflict with estimates derived from alternative conceptions of urbanization. To date, however, the detailed spatial and settlement boundary data needed to analyze and reconcile these differences have not been available. This paper presents gridded estimates of population at a resolution of 1 km along with two spatial renderings of urban areas—one based on the official tabulations of population and settlement types (i.e., statutory towns, outgrowths, and census towns) and the other on remotely-sensed measures of built-up land derived from the Global Human Settlement Layer. We also cross-classified the census data and the remotely-sensed data to construct a hybrid representation of the continuum of urban settlement. In their spatial detail, these materials go well beyond what has previously been available in the public domain, and thereby provide an empirical basis for comparison among competing conceptual models of urbanization. Dataset: Available at http://www.ciesin.columbia.edu/data/india-census-grids. Dataset License: Creative Common License CC-BY. Keywords: India; urbanization; population; census; built-up area; Global Human Settlement Layer; grid; raster 1. Introduction India, the world’s most populous country, is also one of the least urban. At the time of the most recent census in 2011, 31% of the country’s population lived in urban areas according to the official statistics [1]. Yet by other accounts, this 31% figure is far too low [2–4]. Such disagreements stem from different conceptual models of urbanization—the higher percentages are derived from a “statistical” perspective in which urban-ness is defined in terms of population density, areal contiguity, and the total population of sufficiently dense contiguous areas. This approach stands in contrast to the official classifications for India, which blend the statistical perspective with an alternative view that takes the legal boundaries of urban jurisdictions into account. Both perspectives have merit; but it has proven difficult to reconcile them because the data needed to do so have not been available in the public domain. Data 2019, 4, 35; doi:10.3390/data4010035 www.mdpi.com/journal/data Data 2019, 4, 35 2 of 16 This paper places into the public domain two detailed sets of gridded estimates of urban and rural areas at 1 km (or finer) resolution. One set is based on India’s official criteria, providing a spatial representation of urban and rural communities as these are officially defined. The second set of estimates is informed by the statistical perspective on urbanization, drawing on approaches that integrate disparate data to indicate urban population [5]; these estimates extend the official criteria via remotely-sensed measures of the density of structures, obtained from the Landsat imagery processed by the Global Human Settlement Layer research team [6]. Taken in combination, our estimates provide what has long been lacking: an empirical basis for a rigorous comparison of competing urban definitions. We have made available two 2011 snapshots capturing a moment in India’s upward trajectory of urbanization, which in the coming decades will have wide-ranging consequences for human well-being and the natural environment [7–11]. To accompany these two urban classification grids, we also produce a grid of population using the same finely-resolved spatial units—not previously used as inputs in any other spatial population dataset—so that urban location and population may be examined together. 2. Data Description Before describing the data collection on population and urban classifications in India that we have produced and disseminated with this article, we should first explain the empirical ingredients. 2.1. Input Data Three types of data were needed to generate high-resolution grids of India’s urban areas and population: Settlement-level demographic data from the 2011 population census; spatial boundaries that delineate these settlements; and remotely-sensed data on built-up area. Each is described in turn. 2.1.1. Population Census Abstracts In a welcome departure from previous practice, India’s Office of the Registrar General and Census Commissioner has placed into the public domain a very large collection of detailed, settlement-specific tabulations of 2011 population census data. For the purposes of this research, the key tabulations come in the form of what are termed primary census abstracts (PCAs)—they cover places ranging in size from tiny rural villages to small- and medium-sized towns and upward to the largest of India’s municipalities, providing information on the population of each settlement, its number of households, and selected additional characteristics. Complementary spatial data—to be described below—are available for a total of 4041 legally-constituted urban areas (statutory towns), 3893 so-called census towns, and 640,930 rural villages. The statutory towns are further subdivided into wards, with an abstract produced for each ward. Some of these wards are additionally designated as outgrowths. The four urban categories—statutory towns, wards, outgrowths, and census towns—require a few words of explanation. Statutory towns are governed by one of the many forms of urban local governmental authority that exist in India, with the Constitution giving considerable latitude to state governors in decisions about whether and what type of authority to establish. The legal basis is set out in the Constitution of India PART IXA–243Q, as follows: “Constitution of Municipalities. (1) There shall be constituted in every State, (a) a Nagar Panchayat (by whatever name called) for a transitional area, that is to say, an area in transition from a rural area to an urban area; (b) a Municipal Council for a smaller urban area; and (c) a Municipal Corporation for a larger urban area, in accordance with the provisions of this Part: Provided that a Municipality under this clause may not be constituted in such urban area or part thereof as the Governor may, having regard to the size of the area and the municipal services being provided or proposed to be provided by an industrial establishment in that area and such other factors as he may deem fit, by public notification, specify to be an industrial township. (2) In this article, ‘a transitional area’, ‘a smaller urban area’ or ‘a larger urban area’ means such area as the Governor may, having regard to the population of the area, the density of the population therein, the revenue generated for local administration, the percentage of employment in Data 2019, 4, 35 3 of 16 non-agricultural activities, the economic importance or such other factors as he may deem fit, specify by public notification for the purposes of this Part”. Wards are electoral units that are overseen by statutory-urban governing bodies. There is no automatic rule by which statutory towns and their constituent wards come into being on the basis of well-defined demographic and economic criteria. Indeed, a notable and much commented-upon feature of Indian urbanization has to do with the reluctance of some states to allow their large, urban-like villages to be legally declared urban. The public finance problem is that an urban authority may not be eligible for development funds that are earmarked for rural areas, and depending on circumstance, state governors may be unpersuaded of the potential for obtaining commensurate urban development funds [2–4]. These dueling political–economy considerations may well combine to produce under-estimates of India’s urban percentages, an issue that we will investigate in what follows. Among all the wards of a statutory town, some can be designated as outgrowths, these being units which hold a type of dual status. An outgrowth is an area of high-density, arguably urban settlement that is spatially adjacent to a statutory town, and which would thus seem to be poised on the threshold of becoming legally urban. However, outgrowths are in fact governed by rural authorities. The ambiguous status of outgrowths is signified in their PCA identifier codes: outgrowths are assigned both a village code and a code defining the outgrowth as a ward of the statutory town. In India’s tabulations of urban population, outgrowths are treated as urban. Much like outgrowths, census towns are legally rural settlements, but they are designated as urban for the purposes of an upcoming census and grouped with statutory urban areas in the official post-census tabulations. The census-town designation emerges in the course of discussions between census authorities and state government officials in the lead-up to each new census [12–14]. There are specific demographic and socioeconomic criteria that are meant to guide the discussions, but these criteria are evaluated on the basis of data gathered in the previous census, a practice that leaves ample room for misunderstandings of local trends and variations in judgement [14].